Page 38 of My Pucking Enemy (The Milwaukee Frost #4)

Wren

“What do you want?”

There’s stunned silence on the other end of the line. Or maybe it’s not stunned. Maybe my father has never been stunned in his life.

From the moment I walked out of the Frost arena until I just finally, finally gave in and hit the green button to answer the call, he’s been ringing me nonstop, back-to-back, so I can’t even wallow reading articles about Luca and me online.

After almost a full year of me ignoring his calls, I’ve finally answered. So perhaps there is a moment of shock on his end, and that’s why it takes him a few seconds to say something. Maybe he never really thought I would answer.

I wish I could be the version of myself who didn’t.

“Wren.”

“Obviously. Obviously it’s me, since you won’t fucking leave me alone.”

I’m sitting on the bare couch in my bare apartment, staring up at a kidney-shaped water stain on the ceiling. Again, there’s a pause, and this time I don’t know if it’s because he’s shocked at the way I spoke to him, or if he’s putting together what he’s planning to say.

“I have a job for you, Dubs.”

“Find someone else.”

“I need you.” A beat ticks by and he adds, “I have a job, and I need someone I can trust.”

“You can’t trust me.”

“Au contraire—you are the only person I do. You went to prison for me, my dear.”

I swallow down my objections—it’s not the truth of what happened. I close my eyes, my young self resurfacing, coming back to me. The moment I realized that if I turned myself in—if I took the fall for everything—I could potentially find myself in a normal life.

A life in which I wouldn’t have to look over my shoulder. A life in which I could do normal things, like renting an apartment. Dating guys.

And look how that’s turned out for me.

“I’m not doing that kind of shit anymore,” I tell him. “I’m not even supposed to be talking to you.”

“It’s a secure line. They can’t track you on this.”

That’s not the point.

“Look, Wren,” Dad goes on, his familiar rough voice getting a bit smoother as he turns on his charm. The cadence he uses when he’s trying to get something he wants. “I know you were fired from that hockey thing. And I know you need the money. That home you picked for Louise is not cheap.”

I’m aware of that. It’s the first thing I thought of when I walked out of Uncle Vic’s office. All I could think about as I packed up my things, realizing not only was I not going to get the bonus for winning the Stanley Cup, but I would not be getting a regular paycheck, period.

After getting fired from the Frost, what’s the likelihood that I’ll be able to find a job? Uncle Vic was my best reference, and he thinks I’m sabotaging the team’s shot at the Cup.

I could talk to my connections at the Bureau, but how long is that going to take? If it’s more than a month or two, I’ll run out of savings, and what will happen to Gran then?

“She’s your mother,” I seethe into the phone, trying to control my anger. Here I am, sitting in the middle of my apartment in the middle of my own personal devastation, and of course my father found a way to get to me. It’s like he can sniff out when a person is at their lowest point.

“Maybe you should just pay for it yourself.”

“I would, Dubs, you know that,” Dad says, “if only I had the money. You know, that last job we did together didn’t end so well.”

I don’t know that, and I think he’s lying out his ass. If he wanted to help pay for Gran’s care—for her home—then he would have found a way. That’s one thing I’ve learned about my father—if he wants to do something, he will.

And I’m sure he’s made a lot more money after our little betting scheme came tumbling down. That job ended with me in police custody, and my father running free after his arrest. There’s no way he’s been laying low this entire time.

Unless… it occurs to me for the first time that maybe he has been laying low. Maybe he realized that, without me, he couldn’t pull things off like he used to. It sparks a note of pride in me, but it’s quickly followed by a thrill of fear.

If Dad knows he can’t do it without me, that means nothing will stop him from trying to get me back.

Once again, that feeling from Uncle Vic’s office settles over me.

All this time, I’ve been doing my best. Serving my time, then working for the FBI.

Trying to prove to all the people around me that I can be trusted.

That I should be allowed my own life after a childhood I didn’t choose, didn’t want.

And now, after all this effort, I’m right back where I started. Maybe even lower than before. At least in prison—and the FBI—I felt like things were going up. Like I was improving, getting better, watching my life resurrect itself around me.

Now, I feel like I’m sitting at the bottom of a well, and someone at the top is sliding the cover on to block even my view of the stars.

“What kind of job?” I hear myself saying it like I’m not inside my own body, and my heart thumps dangerously loud in my chest the moment I do.

I can practically hear my father’s smile through the phone. He’s always so fucking self-satisfied when he gets what he wants.

“Meet me at three o’clock,” he says, “I’ll get you more information about the place. And don’t be late, Dubs. That’s not how I raised you.”